


After the Storm

by Rehearsal_Dweller



Category: Newsies (1992), Newsies!: the Musical - Fierstein/Menken
Genre: College AU, M/M, Modern AU
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2020-09-18
Updated: 2020-09-18
Packaged: 2021-03-07 18:08:26
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 3,097
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/26521918
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/Rehearsal_Dweller/pseuds/Rehearsal_Dweller
Summary: Tony spends the summer asRace,and it feels a little like borrowing Jack’s clothes – comfortable and familiar, but ill-fitting.
Relationships: Spot Conlon/Racetrack Higgins
Comments: 16
Kudos: 56





	After the Storm

**Author's Note:**

> Hi! I don't know if I'll actually link it to the series, but this slots between chapters 2 & 3 of the NMAU(etc)'s first fic, Parallel. It's about the summer between sophomore and junior year of college for Race, after his breakdown midyear. I've been thinking about this a lot lately and I'm pretty happy with how it turned out! I hope you guys like it, too :)

The thing about the summer after sophomore year of college is that everything is different, and at the same time absolutely nothing is different.

The thing about Race – Tony, but Race – is that he is completely different, and yet –

Well, Tony, but Race.

A few months ago, Race fell to absolute pieces. He’s still sort of picking those pieces up, all the while trying to play as normal as possible for his friends.

“I’m changing my major,” Race says as casually as he can over dinner. It’s been three days since he and Spot got home from school.

“Why?” says Crutchie, which, like. Fair.

“’Cause astrophysics and I just weren’t working out,” says Race, shrugging. He doesn’t meet Crutchie’s eye.

“What are you looking to switch to, Race?” Bryan asks gently. He and Race have talked about it a few times between Race’s gigantic breakdown and now, but Race appreciates him steering the conversation away from the aforementioned gigantic breakdown.

“Early childhood ed,” says Race. “And maybe some dance classes?” He pushes his green beans around his plate a little. “I haven’t had time to really dance since I started, and it’s really been bugging me. I figure if I made the dancing part’a my education there’s no way being in classes can cut into the time, y’know?”

“That sounds like a great idea,” says Bryan. “I think you’ll make a great teacher. Don’t you think, Charlie?”

“Yeah, I bet’cha will,” says Crutchie, still frowning at Race a little.

Race wishes, a little bit, that the floor would open up and swallow him whole so he wouldn’t have to face Crutchie looking at him like that.

The tough thing about Crutchie being concerned about him is that he and Crutchie share a bedroom at home.

“You’re acting weird,” Crutchie says, laying on his side and facing Race across the room. “Did something happen, at school?”

“I’m not acting weird,” Race lies. “Nothing happened, I just – I wasn’t feeling physics, is that a crime?”

“No, but – you know you could tell me if something was wrong, right?” Crutchie says quietly. “I know we don’t see as much of each other as we used to, but you’re my brother in every way that matters and I’m here for you.”

Race swallows, trying to clear the tightening feeling of oncoming tears. “Yeah, Charlie. I know.” He blinks a few times. “Hey, I love you.”

“I love you, too, Racer,” Crutchie says, sounding just a hair confused. “Are you sure you’re okay?”

“What, I can’t tell my best friend turned almost brother I love him?”

“You can, but you usually don’t.”

Race hums. “I’m just –“ he sighs. “Good night, Crutch.”

“G’night, Race.”

\--

“Hey, Race?” Bryan says the next morning, “I wanted to talk to you for a bit before you run off into the world with Medda’s boys.”

“Yeah, Bry,” Race replies. Crutchie gives him another funny look. “Go ahead, I’ll catch you up.”

“Okay,” Crutchie says, slightly suspiciously.

Bryan doesn’t speak again until they hear the front door shut behind Crutchie.

“Race –“

“Tony,” Race cuts in. “Could you call me Tony, Bry?”

“Of course,” says Bryan. “Tony, then. I just want to check in. The last time we talked on the phone, you were still really shaken up. How’ve you been doing?”

“Better,” Race tells him, and it’s honest. “A lot better. I don’t know where I’d be without Spot, though, he’s been a lifesaver.”

“I’m glad you haven’t been going through this alone, kiddo,” Bryan replies. “You’d _tell_ me if there were anything I could do to help you, right?”

“Of course I would,” Race lies. He wouldn’t, not because he doesn’t trust Bryan to help but because Bryan has already helped Race so fucking much and he doesn’t want to ask any more of him.

“Tony,” Bryan says, a hint of sternness in his tone. “I just want to help.”

“I know,” says Race. “I know. I just – I can take care of myself.”

“I know you can, kiddo,” says Bryan, “but you’re nineteen. You don’t _have_ to take care of yourself.”

“You’ve already done so much, Bry,” Race says softly. “Getting me out of Dana and Leo’s house – that’s more than enough. I can’t ask any more of you.”

Bryan reaches over and ruffles his hair, just like he always used to when Race was Anthony, and he’d come over to play with Charlie after school. Race is taller now, and his hair is longer, but for just this one tiny moment, he sinks into the familiar comfort of the gesture.

“Sometimes you say stuff like that, Tony, and it just makes me want to go have words with Dana all over again,” Bryan says, shaking his head. “It’s not about asking for anything. You’re not going to overstep your welcome. You’re my _son_ , in every way that matters, and that means that I’m going to look out for you, okay? I’m here for you.”

“I know,” says Race, “I know you are, I just –“ He sighs a little, curling in on himself. “I know.”

“I know you know,” says Bryan. “Let me know if there’s any way I can help you, okay?”

Race nods.

“Promise?”

“I promise.”

“Okay.” Bryan ruffles Race’s hair again. “Go play with your friends.”

“Ugh, you make it sound like we’re still eight,” Race whines.

“Go,” Bryan repeats, laughing.

Race doesn’t need telling a third time. He smushes his feet into some shoes and starts the easy walk from the Denton house to the Larkin house.

This spring isn’t the first time Race has had a breakdown and upended his whole life. Although it could be argued that in junior year it had gone the other way around – his whole life had been upended, and then he had a breakdown.

Race came out to his parents in his junior year of high school. It went – well, Race supposes on his darker nights that it could’ve gone a lot worse, but it didn’t go great. And it ended with Dana Higgins telling him that “if you’re serious about this, then you’re no son of mine. Come back when you’ve gotten some sense into you.”

He’d walked to Crutchie’s house.

The Higginses didn’t live _especially_ far from the Denton house, but it’s not the easy five minute walk from Bryan’s to Medda’s he’s taking now. It was dusk when Race left his parents’ house and fully dark when he got to Bryan’s.

He’d asked to spend the night. To let it all blow over.

He’d never gone back to Leo and Dana’s.

It had taken a long time for him to get himself sorted out, after that. A lot longer, even, than it took for his friends’ parents to band together to get the practicalities and legalities sorted.

Race knows, deep down, that even three and a half years later, he’s still a little scrambled over it all. It’s probably mixed up in how anxious he feels – even now, even almost four months after falling to pieces and after letting Spot convince him that the only expectation that really, truly matters in all of this is his own – about being a massive disappointment by giving up on physics. He’s supposed to be a certain way, he was always supposed to be a certain way, and at every turn he ends up a mess and a disappointment and a terrible son.

He takes a breath.

Bryan is not Dana, and Bryan _does not care_ what Race’s major is as long as he’s happy.

Race doesn’t knock on the Larkins’ front door. It’s unlocked, and he’s expected, and he knows even if he weren’t that he’s always welcome here.

He calls a greeting to Medda, who’s tucked away in her home office down the hall, and ducks downstairs into the basement.

“The party has arrived!” Race announces as he bounds down the stairs.

“Good, I thought you’d, like, died,” says Jack, laughing. “Bry tellin’ you off for failing college?”

“I ain’t failing anything,” says Race, playing offended. “I’m _switching majors_.”

“Yeah, yeah,” says Crutchie. “Whatever you say, Racer.”

Race flops onto the couch next to Spot. “Heya, sweets.”

“Hey, Race,” Spot replies, and even after just a few months the nickname feels odd out of Spot’s mouth. He reaches for Race’s hand, not quite holding it but skimming his fingertips across the back of his knuckles. “You alright, sugar?”

Race nods. “M’fine. I’ll – we can talk later about it.”

“Okay,” says Spot. “Just lemme know, okay?”

“Yeah.”

“Spot!” Crutchie says, tapping his fingertips against his knee impatiently. “You said you had news.”

“Right,” Spot replies. _Now_ he interlaces his fingers with Race’s. “Guys, uh. I’m gay.”

“Oh!” says Crutchie, looking genuinely surprised. Race can’t blame him – Spot had pretty firmly held the _only straight friend in the group_ role in high school.

“Hell yeah!” says Jack. “Welcome to the club, man!”

Race sees Crutchie’s eyes flick down to Race and Spot’s joined hands, but he doesn’t mention it.

“Have you told Mama yet?” Jack asks, leaning forward with his elbows on his knees to study his brother.

“No,” says Spot. He chuckles a little nervously. “I’ve actually never said it out loud before.”

Race squeezes his fingers gently. It’s true – unless Spot’s gone secretly coming out to strangers, this is the first time the words “I’m gay” have actually crossed his lips. Race knew, of course, because he and Race are –

They’re something. They’re boyfriends, strictly, but even only a few weeks into this tentative new relationship, Race has a strong feeling that that isn’t a strong enough word.

Anyway, Race knew, because two weeks ago Spot told him he loved him in their dorm room, but Spot said _I love you_ and he didn’t say _I’m gay_.

“Proud’a you,” Crutchie says, nodding firmly.

“You’re _going_ to tell Mama, right?” says Jack. “Because, like, I could really go for a rainbow cake.”

Spot laughs at that, and some of the tension breaks.

\--

Race spends a lot of afternoons that summer curled up with Spot on his bed. Spot does what Spot wants – sometimes he’ll read, sometimes he’ll play on his phone, sometimes he’ll just hold Race – and Race sleeps.

Race sleeps a _lot_ that summer.

He kind of picked up his entire life plan and put it in a blender and is still sort of figuring out exactly where and how to pour out the resulting goo, and that process is _fucking exhausting_. So in between days when he lets Jack drag him out to make bad decisions, or he follows Crutchie on some interesting adventure, or he camps out in Buttons’s back yard with him and Romeo, or some combination of all of the above, he crashes _hard_. And he happens to prefer crashing in Spot’s room, where he can be held and talked through minor crises.

Today is one such day.

“Sean, will you still love me if I’m this much of a disaster for the rest of our lives?” he moans into Spot’s t-shirt.

“Yes,” Spot says simply.

“Oh,” says Race. That’s actually incredibly reassuring, if a little difficult to believe fully.

“I love you, Tony,” says Spot. “Even the messy parts. Okay?”

“Okay,” says Race.

“And I know,” Spot continues, combing his fingers gently through Race’s curls, “that you _won’t_ always feel this lost. You _won’t._ I know it feels like that right now, but we’ll get through to the other side of this and you’ll be okay.” He kisses the top of Race’s head before continuing. “And then one day, _you’ll_ be the steady one and _I’ll_ be the disaster. And that’ll be okay, too.”

“When’d you grow up so much, Spotty?” Race asks, pushing up on his hands over Spot.

“Same time you did, sweetness,” says Spot. He pats his chest, indicating for Race to lay back down. “C’mere, baby. I gotcha.”

“I can’t believe I got you,” Race says, relaxing a little and laying back down. “Like, holy shit, sugar, you’re – are you sure?”

“Yes,” Spot says again, just as easily and simply as he had a few minutes ago. There is no trace of the frustration that Race worries he must be feeling at all these summer days wasted talking through Race’s issues in circles.

“And you don’t hate that I can’t get out of my own head?”

“Never.”

“Even if I ask you a hundred more times before the summer ends if you mean it?”

“Even a thousand.” Spot’s fingers wind into Race’s hair again. “Even more. I love you, Tony.”

“I love you, Spot,” Race says.

“Good,” says Spot. “That’s all I need. I gotcha through the rest.”

“I’m a mess,” Race says.

“You’re nineteen,” Spot says. “That’s no big news. You think my brother’s not a mess? Racetrack Higgins, look at me and tell me that you think Jack Kelly isn’t a mess.”

“He’s not a mess like this,” says Race.

“That’s bullshit,” says Spot. “He’s two failed relationships away from completely self-destructing and you know it. We all know it, but there’s nothing we can do to stop it. We just gotta hope he lets us look out for him when he does.”

“Well, yeah, but that’s Jack –“

“And you’re Tony, and you deserve time and space to figure yourself out, just as much as Jack does,” Spot cuts in. “Just as much as Crutchie does, or Romes, or Buttons, or me. You hear me?”

“I hear you,” says Race. He smushes his face into Spot’s shirt again. Quietly, barely a whisper, he says, “I don’t know if you’re _right_ , but I hear you.”

“Tony,” Spot says, a little stern. “Tones.” He taps the top of Race’s head to get him to meet his eye. “Take all the time in the world to work this out if you have to, okay? You’re not going to scare me away.”

Race almost believes him. “Okay. If you say so, okay.”

“Well, I do,” says Spot. He kisses Race’s hair. “You’re tired, I can tell.”

“Exhausted.”

“Sleep, sugar,” Spot tells him. “I’ll be here when you wake up.”

He is.

\--

“You doin’ okay, Racer?” Jack asks. They’re holed up in Jack’s room. The others are all busy today – Spot’s helping Smalls with some project downstairs, Crutchie has been roped into errands with Bryan, Romeo’s got chores, and Buttons is out with a college friend – so Race is perched on the edge of Jack’s bed, watching him paint.

They’ve spent many an afternoon in these exact positions, and yet like everything else in Race’s life this summer, it doesn’t quite feel the same.

(Tony, but Race.)

“I’m fine,” Race lies through his teeth. “Why wouldn’t I be?”

Jack hums, turning back to his painting. “You just seem a little off, s’all. You’ve been spendin’ a lotta time in my brother’s room, an’ I gotta make sure your brain’s not fried from all that one-on-one contact with Spot.”

“Might be,” says Race, laughing. Race has a feeling Jack hasn’t picked up what’s going on between him and Spot, and that’s really funny to him.

“You sure you’re okay?” Jack asks. There’s a note of clear sincerity in his voice that surprises Race. He knew – he’s known a long time – that Jack genuinely cares for him, of course, but it’s usually tempered with teasing, with play.

It’s very rarely expressed so plainly.

Race combs through his hair with his fingers. Sincerity deserves honesty, but only a bit. “This year was a little rougher on me than I’d have liked. I’m dealing.”

“Good,” says Jack. “That you’re dealing, I mean.”

“Yeah,” says Race. “Spot’s been real patient with me, even when I got all fed up with physics and decided I was going to teach babies instead.”

Jack laughs. “I gotta say, Race, I’ve known Spot a couple’a years now, and I don’t feel like patient is a word I’d use to describe him.”

“Yeah, that’s ‘cause you _try_ his patience at every fucking turn,” Race points out, grinning. “I’m a goddamn angel compared to you, Cowboy.”

“Like hell you are!” Jack says. He throws a wet, painty rag at Race, and it hits him smack in the center of the face.

“You’ll pay for that, fucker!” says Race, which is the only warning that Jack gets before Race launches himself off of the bed and tackles him to the floor.

\--

Race loves being home, he really does.

He loves spending time with his friends, loves seeing Bryan and Medda and Smalls (and Smalls is actually taller than Spot, now, which Race thinks is fucking _hilarious_ ), and he loves being in the house, in the room he shares with Crutchie.

 _But_ he is absolutely itching to leave.

By the time August rolls around, he’s more confident than he’d ever been that he doesn’t want to be Race anymore. It doesn’t feel right anymore, doesn’t feel like him. But at the same time, he’s not ready to shed that with the boys just yet.

So he’s just dying to get back to school, get back to the corner of the world where he and Spot are on their own and he can sort out his goddamn identity crisis in peace.

Two days before they move back to school, Race gives in to an urge he’s been holding back most of the summer, and kisses Spot full on the mouth in the middle of his and Crutchie’s bedroom. None of that _keep it casual when somebody might walk in_ bullshit – just Race and Spot and no fucking fear for ten fucking seconds. They aren’t really afraid of getting caught, anyway, it’s more the fear of outing how tightly entangled their relationship is to the breakdown Race has spent the summer pretending he isn’t having.

They separate after a moment, breathing heavily, foreheads pressed together.

“I love you, Sean,” says Race.

Spot gives him one last little peck. “I love you too, sweetness.”

They let Crutchie map packing the car up for them, because it really truly matters to Crutchie in a way Race has never understood. They get everything in and it does look nice, but they’re just going to unpack in a few days and never think about it again.

Medda sends them off with ruffled hair and a new roadtrip playlist. Bryan gives them both tight hugs and puts a box of snacks in the backseat, just in reach of the passenger’s seat.

The summer – which has passed in a weird blur of naps and sprained wrists and dancing and naps and tears – is over as soon as it had begun.


End file.
